In November of 2017, San Luis City Council authorized a multi-year contract for the purchase of 27 portable radios for the City of San Luis Fire Department.

As was stated then, I reported that these radios had reached their service life and would no longer be supported by Motorola for parts and accessories.

I am requesting that the City of San Luis and the City of San Luis Fire Department dispose of these radios by:
• Assigning four (4) radios to our Public Safety Communication Center (SLPSCC) for use by our communication personnel as an emergency backup radio, should our system experience a temporary failure.

These radios will supplement radios already in the SLPSCC and while they will still not be supported for maintenance and accessories, we believe that being in a desktop charger in the climate controlled setting will stretch out their service life, compared to being front line fire radios and in and out of vehicles.

Should they need to be replaced, we can defer the purchase to another year.

• Donate the balance (estimated to be about 20 radios) of the SLFD radios to Arizona Western College (AWC) Fire Academy Program.  Presently the Fire Academy uses “job com” type radios (CB radios) for communication training, fire ground simulations, and coordination of live fire training evolutions. 

I have been in contact with the Yuma Regional Communication System (YRCS) Manager and raised this subject to the YRCS Executive Board for consideration.  The YRCS Manager has assured me that it is possible to re-program these radios in such a manner that they would not create a load on the YRCS system. 

When asked by an Executive Board member regarding any trade-in or resale value of these obsolete radios, the YRCS manager stated that they had been offered a bid of $100.00 per radio; to include the radio, any and all accessories (leather holster, belt clip, battery, spare battery, desktop charger, remote microphone, etc.). 

It is my opinion that donating these radio to AWC’s Fire Academy is the best option considering that if these radios were disposed of through a San Luis surplus auction, they may be reprogrammed by a technically competent geek and could interfere with our radio system.